South Korea Buying Weapons for its new F-15Ks

On June 20/08, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency announced [PDF] South Korea’s official request for a variety of weapons to equip its air force, in conjunction with the planned Direct Commercial Sale of 21 additional F-15K Strike Eagle fighters detailed in “Korea’s F-X Multi-Role Fighter Buy, Phase 2: The Race is Over“. The total value, if all options are exercised, could be as high as $200 million.

The principal contractor is Raytheon in Tucson, AZ. South Korea should have no problem integrating these weapons, and there are currently 4 U.S. Air Force pilots and 5 maintenance Extended Training Service Specialists in the Republic of Korea. They are expected to remain for the next 5 years.

The proposed order includes:

125 AIM-120C-7 Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missiles (AMRAAM). This is the most advanced AMRAAM in large-scale production. A more advanced AIM-120D version is currently in testing.

14 AIM-120C Captive Air Training Missiles, with seekers but no rocket motors.

2 AIM-120C Dummy Air Training Missiles.

35 AGM-65G MAVERICK Missiles. They are especially designed for use against hardened tactical targets, and use imaging infrared (IIR) guidance to make them fire-and-forget.